h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Also, much sympathy to Kelli. Lack of sleep is unbelievably horrible, which is why it's used as a torture device.

I've always found the people being unsympathetic and ha-ha-ha about disturbed nights are either blessed with dozy babies and therefore don't actually have a clue, or blessed with exceptionally screamy babies who have now grown up and who are remembering it all on the public school system - ie, 'I used to fag and it was awful, so now I will feel aggrieved if the next generation gets out of fagging scot free. It's not fair if I had to and you don't have to'. This is also probably why bouncing into a circle of EXHAUSTED parents having a well-earned moan and announcing 'my baby has slept through the night since six weeks!' (I was there, I witnessed this scene) is an excellent way of ensuring absolutely no one will baby-sit for you for the next three months.

My own current bout of insomnia is entering day six, is it? Seven? And I want to cut my head off NOW. I can't imagine how I'd feel after months of it.

Yes Ag, teenagers, really! *looks at Ripley wondering if the long absence might have had any long term effects on his temper*

So Thesaurases are tameable, eh? Impressive work!

I don't know if Roget is tamed, exactly. More...tempered?

I was one of those incredibly lucky mothers, and so I did something nice...I would take the babies who didn't sleep through the night in the afternoons for my friends, so they could get some sleep. It wasn't much, but since I was blessed with a child who, at about 18 months, would put herself to bed (not kidding...she'd pick up her blanket and announce that she was ready for bed), it was the least I could do.

Kelli, if I was anywhere near you, I'd do it for you, too. I mean it!

Kelli, I couldn't do it. And I don't know how you do.



Had a nice thing already happen this morning. The New Phone of Shininess is one of those touch-screen iClone jobbies, which I don't dislike but which takes a we bittie getting used to. However, it doesn't pick up the very weak Orange signal I get in the house.

Anyhoo - I was worried I'd be stuck in this situation until I move house because I bought the phone from a shop and therefore waived my right to 14 days for buyers' remorse. If I'd bought it online I could send it back. So I rang them up to bleat and whimper - and here comes the thing - I can direct the phone through my WiFi when I'm in the house!

That is how technology should work. I am officially Very Happy Indeed.



Had a pleasant but busy weekend seeing my dissertation supervisor, the Banksy exhibition and Z's grandmother. We dropped in to the Shrewsbury folk festival (what an astonishingly attractive town Shrewsbury is) but we weren't able to spend very long there. We also knocked off a Stately Home yesterday, so all in all it feels like far more than 4 days since I was last at work.

Monday morning came a day late this week.

Still while it's not good about the fall Lil, it is good you were able to get help.

It's only been a few days since I was here, spent drinking, kite flying and gardening, why can't I remember what i'm supposed to be doing?

Marv, that's good The team I work with drop hints that we like the odd gift of a box of biscuits/chocolate/donuts. Occasionally it works and you know what, those that do those kinds of things seem to get a slightly better level of service

Oh yes Mrs Zen, who did you see when at the Shrewsbury folk festival and did you think they were any good?

I'm glad you had your phone with you, lil. Doesn't bear thinking of what could have happened otherwise.

Kelli, you have my sympathies. My first born never slept for more than a few hours in a row - for a whole year. He screamed a lot. I was down to 7.5 stone and totally exhausted.
Son #2 was a quiet baby and slept well.

Hope Lil's been all right.

I spent ban collie day mostly sitting around - outside at Kirkstall Abbey with the paper and then inside watching The Wire. Then I thought I'd better achieve something and packed things into boxes ready to move.

Glad you were able to summons help, lil


Kelli, I was fortunate with my first, she was an

VV on the other hand, certainly let us know she was there....

... Come to think of it, she still does!


lilac x

Apparently I did nothing but scream for the first two years...

I'm glad you weren't down for too long, Lil

And another for kelli.

Thanks for the sympathy folks, am very tired and miserable today...

...and now angry. I just read a comment on one of my mum's boards that someone read on the internet that childhood vaccinations cause allergies and because the vaccines have "dead foetus protein" in them this causes women to have miscarriages later. No links to actual studies were provided. This was followed by a load of panicky mums saying they were going to think twice about having their children vaccinated in that case. I am too tired and too annoyed to draft a coherent and polite response.

It's muppets like that that ruin it for the rest of us. Vaccinations are so important for country-wide health.

Can you yikes that comment, kelli?

On what grounds? The person isn't saying it is necessarily true, just that they read it on the internet and would not be vaccinating her own kids. I've tried to draft a response twice but they sound too ranty and I don't want to spark a flame war which doesn't help anyone.

Someone else has asked for links to the source of the information but none yet forthcoming...

Being ranty sounds like a perfectly reasonable response to that sort of thing Kelli . My cousins wife is a campaigner for stop MMR , would I sign her petition ? nope . We don't get on . Shes one of those pseudo vegetarians that wont eat things that are fluffy , chicken and fish are ok . .
Banksy , heard a sketch on the radio the other day where his identity was uncovered and it turned out he was Rolf Harris

Sounds like a panicky first-time parent, Kelli. MAybe add some links in your post to the positives of vaccinations?

I just got the Star vaccinated with his MMR jab.

The thing is, I did find myself quite alarmed by the sheer number of mixtures they shot him with in his first few months. I'm sure that it's gone up and in my day things like polio were given on a sugar cube, which somehow seems much less scary. It's not surprising their little bodies react with temperatures and such, and that did freak me out at 2 months.

Still, you grit your teeth and get on with it. Vacinations are definitley a wonder of modern medicine and there's absolutely no way I'd not get one done just because some anonnymous numpty on a message board started posting things she'd read. And I reckon I have more excuse than some to feel nervous as my cousin did, in fact, have her brain fried by the whooping cough injection back in the day.

Irritatingly, despite the fact that I know know know the blasted MMR doesn't cause autism, I did feel a little like I was jumping of a cliff without being one hundred per cent sure I knew how to work the parachute. That sort of scare monguring really doesn't help. Still, round our way, measles is, apparently, rife, so in the end it comes down to a non-existant nightmare vs an actually existant nightmare.

You'd best not tell me which message board, Kelli, as I don't have your restraint and I would still use the word numpty.

Sympathy for the lack of sleep too. It's the pits.

We saw the Dust Poets, Phil, who are a Canadian band and who my friend was with, but we didn't really get to see anyone else.

Good luck with the non-ranting, Kelli. Is it wrong of me to say that the decisions around vaccination are Darwinianism in action? Yes it is. Sorry. *hangs head in shame*

Banksy = Rolf Harris. That would be so cool. Actually I would lay foldie money that he was at art school in Bristol when he first started graffiting there. His gallery stuff had a real art school sensibility to it: technically it's fine, but is a little ... adolescent. It doesn't feel as if it's been tested and criticised in the harsh world of professional art. His street stuff is really powerful, and does feel tested and tempered. So my guess is that he was an art student who ended up with more success on the streets than in the galleries. And no harm there. His politics are rather naive, but that may be just another way of saying he hasn't sold out.

I've got some pics on the Phone of Shininess, more of the people than the exhibition, and I'll put them up when I've learned how to get them off the phone and on to the PC.

Morning all. Only 2 days of work this week then off with the family for a vacation.